Blogs and Commentary

Monday Notebook: NCAA Division II

- One of the perils of consistent success is preconceived
notions become ingrained. My prejudice against No. 6 Le Moyne
– and it's one based on nearly a decade of data – is
that the Dolphins will always be a stingy defensive team. It's
basically Dan Sheehan's calling card.

So when the final score against No. 11 Seton Hill came across
the wire – a 15-10 victory for Le Moyne, in which the two
teams were tied at seven at halftime – I wondered if there
was a paradigm shift in Syracuse. Nope. It's just one of the
realities about opening a season against a good team.

"The first time out is always interesting, and we had no scout
on them from this year," Sheehan said. "I thought our kids did an
excellent job after some adjustments at halftime. We held them
scoreless for 24 minutes in the second half. We had a careless
penalty that put us down for a minute late and we gave up two, but
our defense will only get better."

The 10 goals allowed was somewhat out of character, but the
Dolphins 15 scores is a good sign. Senior attackman Sean Connors
had a hat trick, but nine different players accounted for at least
one goal. That's consistent with Sheehan's offensive
philosophy.

"We are not built to ride any one player, so I would like to see
our balanced scoring," he said.

Le Moyne has three games over the next month against St. Rose,
Colorado Mesa and Adams State before the monstrous, Northeast-10
clash with No. 2 Adelphi. Asked what he was hoping to accomplish in
preparation for the game against the Panthers, Sheehan hit me with
the boilerplate I expected.

"Get better every day, one day at a time," he said.

- What were Sheehan's thoughts on Seton Hill? They could cause
some problems in the ECC.

"They have almost everyone back on offense this year," Sheehan
said. "This team will score a lot of goals all year long. They are
very talented, and are very good stick handlers. We knew we would
have our hands full."

- With the aforementioned cautionary tale about reading too much
into scores from the first game of the season, I won't linger too
long on No. 4 C.W. Post's modest, 9-6 win over Wheeling Jesuit. The
score seems oddly close considering past history (14-3 in '11; 22-5
in '10) and the stats were relatively even, but the Pioneers were
comfortably ahead, 7-2, late in the first half. The final score
says both these teams should be monitored closely over the next few
weeks.

- As surprising as the Le Moyne and Post scores were, No. 7 NYIT
delivered what we expected on their Left Coast swing. Well, in the
first game, anyway. The Bears bounced Notre Dame de Namur, 12-3 on
Friday, but Dominican (Calif.) put up a stiffer fight on
Sunday. The Penguins made a game of it, but eventually fell,
11-8...Pfeiffer once again looks like it has a stingy defensive
team, beating Coker, 9-1. Remember, the Falcons were the only team
to make Limestone sweat in the South region last year...Lees-McRae
picked up the 13-12 overtime win over Florida Tech. Victories will
be a struggle this season for the Bobcats, so it's important to
pick them up when they can...Tampa improves to 3-0 with wins over
Wingate and Coker. Spartans are probably going to be 5-0 heading
into the Limestone game on March 4.